Julian Wright following similar path of past young New Orleans Hornets players

Michael DeMocker, The Times-PicayuneJulian Wright gave the Hornets a lift off the bench late last season, but has remained on the bench for much of this season.

With concern mounting about his lack of playing time and the uncertainty of his role off the bench, second-year Hornets forward Julian Wright walked into Coach Byron Scott's office last month seeking clarification.

Scott welcomed the visit. But instead of easing Wright's concerns, Scott bluntly told him he had regressed since last season, and that his role was to go out and play hard, understand where he is supposed to be on the court and to not repeat mistakes.

When J.R. Smith and Brandon Bass experienced similar struggles in their second seasons with the Hornets under Scott, they requested meetings with the head coach to clarify their roles, too.

The sessions didn't help much. Smith and Bass never made enough progress to satisfy Scott, and eventually moved on to other teams.

Smith, whom the Hornets drafted 18th in 2004, was traded to Chicago two seasons later and has since blossomed with the Denver Nuggets, where he's averaging 13.8 points this season. Bass was selected by the Hornets in the second round in 2005, but they let him leave as a free agent in 2007, and he joined the Dallas Mavericks. He's averaging 7.9 points and 4.4 rebounds this season. Both are primary options off the bench for their teams; Smith is a contender for the NBA's Sixth Man of the Year award.

Wright, a first-round pick in 2007, remains a work in progress. He's averaging 3.1 points and 9.1 minutes this season, but he has played in only half of the Hornets' 40 games. He also was on the inactive list for nine consecutive games this month.

It is too early to tell if he will follow the same path as Smith and Bass, although they were at similar stages of their careers in New Orleans.

The Hornets have emerged as one of the top teams in the Western Conference under Scott, but a number of young players (All-Star point guard Chris Paul being the exception) have struggled to develop in his system.

"I wish I had eight more players like Chris, " Scott said. "Chris is an unusual talent. But a lot of kids today, if they don't have a ball in their hands, they don't know what to do. They just don't have a clue to cut or set a screen."

Although Wright is one of the Hornets' most athletic and promising players, his second season has been limited to mainly inconsequential minutes. Only attrition, through injuries to David West and Tyson Chandler, has led to increased playing time for Wright in the past week.

Earlier this month, Wright complained about playing behind West at power forward and lobbied to return to his customary small forward or shooting guard. Now he is just happy to get an opportunity to play.

"I'm just trying to stay focused, because that's one of the things that can bring minutes, " Wright said. "I don't want to be in a situation where I'm just coasting by. I look at it that you can take something from every game -- good play or bad play."

Since Scott became head coach before the 2004-05 season, the Hornets have had nine draft picks, of which only Hilton Armstrong, Wright and Paul remain on the roster.

"The thing that's changed from three years ago is that now we have established NBA veterans, " Hornets General Manager Jeff Bower said. "It would be hard for a power forward, unless we were picking at the very top of the draft, to come in and make an impact playing behind David West."

"Some guys you can't wait on, " Scott said. "The thing about coaches is that we're based on wins today, not three years from now. When I'm trying to teach a young player how to play this game the right way, he has to do it with his work ethic. I'm not going to sacrifice that to keep him around three or four seasons until he blossoms.

"So I figure if you can't understand what you need to do and what I want you to be, my job is at stake if you are not playing the right way."

Scott said when the Hornets select a draft pick, a few days later the team gives the rookie a playbook and videotape of plays to familiarize him with the system before summer-league play begins a month later.

Times-Picayune Photo ArchiveJ.R. Smith, a candidate for Sixth Man of the Year, admits his immaturity contributed to his lack of success in New Orleans.

Scott said 95 percent of their players still come to summer league without knowing his system. Paul, though, practically knew all the plays before his first summer-league game in 2005. But Smith was among those who struggled to adjust.

"It's one of those situations that if I knew then what I know now, being more mature off the court, it definitely would have been better, " Smith said. "I really was hard-headed, and I pretty much did what I wanted to do. I think we both could have handled the situation different, but that just wasn't the case."

From the time Smith played in his first summer-league game in Long Beach, Calif., Scott was tough on him. He only referred to Smith as "Rook" throughout the 2004-05 season. Scott also pushed Bass to be mostly a defender and rebounder, although Bass, a former LSU standout, was mainly a scorer in college.

At LSU, Bass was chosen SEC Player of the Year as a sophomore after averaging 17.3 points per game. With the Hornets, Bass played in 50 games and averaged 2.2 points.

"I truly liked both of them, and I knew when they got to their second team, they would be better players, " Scott said. "I care about J.R., but he was stubborn. The thing is Jeff Bower and Willis Reed (former basketball operations executive) heard me tell him the things he needed to do, but he would never do them. But I said then as I do now, he is a great talent, and athleticism-wise, has all the tools.

Scott, though, admitted a mistake by not gauging Bass' strengths.

Rusty Costanza, The Times-PicayuneBrandon Bass has thrived since moving on to the Dallas Mavericks, and Hornets Coach Byron Scott admits he limited Bass' role too much in New Orleans.

Bass said it was frustrating playing for the Hornets, and he felt limited offensively.

"I'm not going to sit here and say every decision I made has been right, " Scott said. "The decision of not understanding his true strengths was the problem. That's on me, because he's not a system player, and we had a system. Sometimes when you get guys as talented as he is, you have to scratch the system and say, 'We're going to let this guy play a certain way so they can be successful' -- that was my fault. Brandon's problem with us is that he wanted to score."

Even young players acquired through trades or free agency were slow to make progress, which led to them getting trading or not being re-signed.

During the 2005-06 season, Kirk Snyder beat out Smith at shooting guard and started 45 of 68 games and averaged 8.0 points. But Snyder fell out of favor with Scott during the Las Vegas Summer League because, Scott said, Snyder played like he was a star instead of trying to get better.

Snyder, who is no longer in the NBA, was traded to the Houston Rockets after the Hornets completed their summer-league schedule in July 2006.

Another young player who did not pan out was European star Arvydas Macijauskas, who was unable to learn the playbook by the end of his rookie season (2005-06). He was subsequently waived before the next season after agreeing to a contract buyout.

Regardless, Scott remains steadfast when it comes to dealing with younger players.

He remembers his days as a rookie with the Los Angeles Lakers in 1983, where he had to earn the respect of veterans as well as earn playing time on a championship team. Now he's trying to get the same mental toughness across to his younger players.

"They traded Norm Nixon for me, and everybody acted like it was my fault, " Scott said. "For the first two weeks, they (teammates) were trying to beat me up in practice, hit me and knock me down. Then I said, 'That's the last time this is going to happen.' I told Michael Cooper, 'If you hit me again, I'm going to be swinging.' That got me respect from them, and like I told them, I brought my own shoes, my own game, and I didn't make the trade. The next day, Kareem (Abdul-Jabbar) spoke to me and stopped calling me 'Rook.' "

"I'm hard on them because I've always prided myself on not making the same mistakes twice. If a guy beat me once, he's not going to beat me on the same play again. But I still think it takes three or four years before a young player starts understanding what they really need to do."